The Art of Storytelling

The Art of Telling

Last year I was one of three storytellers working on this project for BTB. finaly here is a write up by David Ambrose.

The Art of Telling – Oral Skills for Secondary School Pupils

Thanks to funding from Arts Council Wales, BTB will be working with pupils from nine Secondary Schools in S Wales during the Winter of 2011/2012, providing young people with the chance to acquire a range of skills derived from telling stories in performance.

The Art of Telling, which is aimed at young people aged 13-15 (Years 9 and 10), will involve one class per school working over a four day period with a professional storyteller, and is taking place in Neath & Port Talbot, Rhondda Cynon Taf, and The Vale of Glamorgan between October 2011 and March 2012.

Using a range of techniques successfully developed in previous projects, the professional storyteller will help turn pupils into storytellers themselves. Each project will end with a ‘Storyteller’s Market’ at which participants have a chance to tell stories to an audience from the local community (in my case this was the feeder schools).

The overall project will culminate in a Young Storytellers Competition, to be held at a venue in each Local Authority area, at which young people from participating schools can come together to compete for the title of Young Storyteller of their area, and offering winners the chance to enter the BTB Young Storyteller competition held during the BTB Festival in July 2012.

As well as helping to develop key skills in literacy, oral presentation and self-confidence in public speaking, the project will also set interested participants on a path towards further public storytelling opportunities: participating pupils will be encouraged to take part in the Young Storytellers of Wales Competition at the International Eisteddfod in July 2012, as well as the annual UKYoung Storyteller of The Year Competition held in Birmingham in March 2013.

BTB also aims to work closely with participating schools to encourage the setting up of out-of-school Storytelling Clubs to keep the storytelling flame alive once each project is over.